Welcome to My Official Web Page!

Welcome to My Official Web Page!

Sunday, April 24, 2011

U: Undertaking

My current WIP feels like a whirlwind compared to my first finished novel. This has been a huge undertaking, basically because I knew next to nothing about the Byzantine Empire when I started.

Yeah, okay, I've taught about it, but my school's 700+ page history book condenses the Byzantine Empire into about three pages. Talk about shortchanging the Eastern Roman Empire (which is yet another example why I don't use textbooks).

So guess where I am at this current undertaking?

80,000 words as of tonight! Woot!

My goal was to be finished by May 1st, but the trip to D.C. and being sick for two weeks knocked me off the writing wagon. School gets out May 19th and I will be done by then.

Keep your fingers crossed for me!


And yes, I skipped some more letters in the A-Z Challenge. Shhh!

Wednesday, April 20, 2011

R: Restoration & Rome

Pompeii is flashy when it comes to ancient Roman sites, but I've always liked Herculaneum more. I went there two years ago and enjoyed the quiet streets of the former seaside town, also destroyed when Mt. Vesuvius erupted in 79AD.

According to The History Blog, you can now see more of Herculaneum. The Decumanus Maximus, Herculaneum's main thoroughfare, has now been reopened after 20 years of being closed for maintenance. This is a huge contrast to Pompeii, which was basically falling apart last year as buildings collapsed.

*shakes fist at Italian government*

And because I can't find my pictures from Herculaneum, here's some of my favorite pics from Rome.






Best angry eyes ever! Can you tell someone was tired of looking at really old stuff? Why hang out in the Coliseum when you could be chasing alley cats?

Tuesday, April 19, 2011

Q: Quarantine

Quarantines have been used since Biblical times to separate the sick from the well (mostly lepers--cool disease to study, but not to have), but the term comes from the Latin word for forty. 14th century Venice required incoming ships to hang out in their harbor for forty days to avoid bringing plague into the city.

Plague? I LOVE plague!

(Again, cool to study, not to have).

You have no idea how thrilled I am to write about bubonic plague in my current WIP- fleas, festering buboes, and bodies piled in towers. Yay!

That said, I think I need someone to quarantine me. I'm currently a walking petri dish--I've threatened my students with coughing all over them if they don't act like angels this week. So far they've complied, mostly because I look like walking death.

Monday, April 18, 2011

P: Pseudo-Prologues

Prologues are bad. Or so they say.

A trend I've noticed in historical fiction is something I'm dubbing the pseudo-prologue (only because I wanted something with a double P for my title). Three of my favorite hist-fic novels--Water For Elephants by Sara Gruen, Exit the Actress by Priya Parmar, and Lady of the Butterflies by Fiona Mountain--all employ this nifty-neato tactic.

What is a pseudo-prologue? It takes a scene toward the end of the novel and makes it Chapter One. Eventually the same scene will reappear, but with some tweaking to make it new again instead of a la Groundhog Day. This worked in all three books to pique my interest--I had to know why that event had happened and how it would be resolved. And I was going to keep turning the pages until I found out.

My first novel had a very linear time frame and it worked well for that story. However, my current WIP is almost certainly going to employ the pseudo-prologue once I get to my first round of edits.

Have you ever used a pseudo-prologue? Or read any books with one?

Sunday, April 17, 2011

Exhausted

See that sleepy gal at the top of my blog? That's how I feel. (I only wish I was in Egypt too!)

We just got back from Washington D.C.--it was awesome, but also exhausting to chaperone teenagers through the capital for a week. Not only that, but I've been sick since the day before we left.

AGAIN! *shakes fist and coughs at stupid viruses*

So I definitely fell off the wagon with the A-Z Challenge. What do you think--should I keep plugging away where I left off and miss the end of the alphabet, or jump into O?

'Cause you know I'm not going to make up the missing posts--I've got a book to finish writing!

Tuesday, April 5, 2011

D: Daughters of Rome

I've been waiting since last year when Kate Quinn's Mistress of Rome debuted for her next book. Daughters of Rome is finally here!

Here's the synopsis, straight from Quinn's website:

A.D. 69. Nero is dead. The Roman Empire is up for the taking. With bloodshed spilling out of the palace and into the streets of Rome, chaos has become the status quo. The Year of Four Emperors will change everything—especially the lives of two sisters with a very personal stake in the outcome…

Elegant and ambitious, Cornelia embodies the essence of the perfect Roman wife. She lives to one day see her loyal husband as Emperor. Her sister Marcella is more withdrawn, content to witness history rather than make it. Even so, Marcella has her share of distinguished suitors, from a cutthroat contender for the throne to a politician’s son who swears that someday he will be Emperor.

But when a bloody coup turns their world upside-down, Cornelia and Marcella—along with their cousins, one a collector of husbands and lovers, the other a horse-mad beauty with no interest in romance—must maneuver carefully just to stay alive. As Cornelia tries to pick up the pieces of her shattered dreams, Marcella discovers a hidden talent for influencing the most powerful men in Rome. In the end, though, there can only be one Emperor…and one Empress.


*wipes drool from chin*

Get thee to a bookstore!

Sunday, April 3, 2011

C: Constantinople

No, you can't go back to Constantinople
Been a long time gone, Constantinople
Why did Constantinople get the works?
That's nobody's business but the Turks.
-Istanbul, We Might Be Giants


Constantinople might have been renamed to Istanbul by Ataturk in the 1920's, but the remains of the old Byzantine city are still scattered about. Here's some of the places my characters are scheming, dying, and carrying on affairs. (And who said history was boring?)











What exotic locales do your stories go to?


All images from Wikimedia Commons.

Saturday, April 2, 2011

B: Blogging

Blogging is not high on my to-do list these days.

I love the community of writers and wish I had more time to blog, but I'm getting ready to take a group of students to Washington D.C. next week and am slated to finish my current WIP by the end of the month if I keep up my current pace of 1,000 words a day.

After a long day at work I come home, play with my daughter, hang out with my husband, go to the gym, research my WIP, and write my 1,000 words.

And collapse into bed to do it all again the next day.

This April A-Z challenge is a great way to meet new bloggers (Hi new followers!) and I'm doing my darndest to keep up with it. Feel free to smuck me upside the head if I fall behind.

What about you? Where does blogging fall on your to-do list?